A deadly new virus warning has been issued by the CDC. (Photo: Flickr.com/Ice Blade)

A deadly new virus warning has been issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In a statement released Thursday, the CDC warned state and local health officials about potential infections from a deadly new virus that has never been seen before in humans.

"Genetic sequence analyses have shown that this new virus is different from any other known human coronaviruses," the CDC stated in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

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The new virus has infected 14 people and killed eight since it was first reported in Sept. 2012. Most of the infections have occurred in the Middle East, specifically Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan, with three instances in the United Kingdom. No cases have been reported in the U.S., the CDC noted.

According to the CDC's analysis, the virus is a coronavirus, which are thought to cause the majority of all common colds in human adults. It is also part of the same family of viruses that caused the deadly outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) that first emerged in Asia in 2003, Fox News reports. When SARS first appeared, it quickly spread to more than two dozen countries in North America, South America, Europe and Asia before it was contained. There were 774 total deaths reported that were caused by SARS, most of which were in China. Viruses of the coronavirus family also cause a number of diseases in animals.

Three of the deadly new virus cases occurred in the UK within a single family. The small outbreak began with a 60-year-old man who had recently traveled to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and who developed a respiratory illness on Jan. 24 while still in the Middle East. The man was hospitalized after returning to the UK, and has been receiving intensive care. Another man living in the 60-year-old's household also got the virus and developed a respiratory illness on Feb. 6. He died shortly after. A second individual, a female in the house, developed a respiratory illness on Feb. 5, but did not need to be hospitalized and has recovered. This is how the CDC learned that the virus can be transmitted through human-to-human contact.

Symptoms of infection with this deadly new virus include severe acute respiratory illness with fever, cough and shortness of breath. The CDC recommends that anyone who traveled from the Arabian Peninsula recently who develops an unexplained respiratory infection within ten days should seek immediate medical treatment. The CDC has yet to issue a warning about restricting travel to the areas affected by the deadly new virus.